On August 28, Secretary Brooke Rollins announced that the USDA was taking the next step in rescinding the Roadless Rule, a rule originally passed in 2001 protecting over 58 million acres of national forest land across the country. Currently around 50% of our national forests are open to drilling, logging and mining, 18% are protected as designated wilderness and the remaining 30% are known as Inventoried Roadless Areas (IRAs). These lands consist of critical wildlife habitat and watersheds, old growth forests, and some of the best recreation opportunities our public lands have to offer.

Methow Valley roadless area protections on the chopping block include much of the Highway 20 corridor over Washington Pass as well as significant portions of the southern Sawtooths, home to many beloved trails for hiking, biking, fishing and hunting.

While supporters of rescinding the Roadless Rule claim that this move will help with preventing wildfire, studies have shown that building more roads through forests actually leads to more fire starts. Wildfires are four times as likely to start in areas with roads than in roadless forest tracts.

Removing the Roadless Rule will opens the door to development and privatization of our public lands. Remember the giant public lands sell-off in the recent reconciliation bill from several months ago? This is essentially the same threat with a new face. While rescinding the rule impacts upwards of 2 million acres of National Forest land in our home state of Washington, this move also impacts many treasured forests across the country including:

• 9 million acres (or 55%) of the Tongass National Forest, the world’s largest intact, old-growth temperate rainforest
• The majority of the Swan Range in MT, due south of Glacier National Park
• Huge swaths of the Wallowa Range in OR
• Nearly a quarter of NM’s Gila National Forest

How to Comment

MVCC encourages community members to submit comments along the following lines:

• Demand that the existing Roadless Rule stay in place
• Share why these areas in the Methow (and beyond!) are special to you and how possible development (road building, logging, mining or potential privatization) would negatively impact them
• Note that building more roads will statistically lead to more fire starts, which we do not want in Okanogan County. Roads also contribute sediment to streams, degrading water quality for fish and downstream communities
• Note that the current $11 billion backlog of deferred maintenance on Forest Service roads will be made much worse if this decision results in more road building.
• Request more comment opportunities and public meetings. This process is being rushed—when the original Roadless Rule was passed, it was after one and a half years, 600 public meetings and 1.6 million public comments showed public support for protecting roadless lands. The agency should be required to put forth an equal amount of outreach to demonstrate public support for rescinding the same Rule.

Comments can be submitted through the federal register through midnight on September 19. Please let us know if you have any questions!